The Wiwi Jury — our in-house panel of music unprofessionals — continues to rate and review the 41 competing entries of Eurovision 2019. Next we take a look at Croatia, where Roko has “The Dream”. Was it a sweet dream or a nightmare? Read on to find out!
Roko – “The Dream”
“The Dream” reviews
Barnabas: There’s one certain thing when I listen to this year’s Croatian entry: this guy will belt those notes out for sure! Although people are whining about “The Dream” being dated, I enjoy it. But if I can give one piece of advice to Roko: get rid of those kitschy wings!
Score: 6/10
Chris: There’s obviously been a lot of thought put in to “The Dream” — unfortunately, that is what’s working most against it. With the cheesy lyrics to the painfully camp wings that Roko’s been saddled with, this feels entirely manufactured. When Jacques Houdek entered “My Friend”, there was a bit of a knowing wink. “The Dream”, in its current form, smashes through subtlety and veers more towards the pantomime.
Score: 4.5/10
Renske: The boy can belt! Having heard of Roko before Eurovision, “The Dream” lets him down so much. Perhaps Eurovision came too soon for him and he should have developed a more personal musical style before entering the contest. “The Dream” lacks everything that Roko has an artist: charisma, originality and emotion. Despite all of that, Roko is still able to show off his incredible vocal-range, which is the highlight of this entry.
Score: 6/10
Jack: “The Dream” is a contender to be the strongest vocal performance of 2019. With or without his giant white wings (and I do hope he’ll be without them), it’s no secret that Roko has the voice of an angel. That’s why it is such a shame that he’s representing Croatia with a dated song with English lyrics that are more of a nightmare than anything. “The Dream” isn’t great, but it’s not horrible either. Roko has a fantastic voice that, if paired with sensible staging and costuming, could produce a really nice moment on stage. That being said, Croatia may have to dare to dream a bit harder if they want any chance of qualifying for the grand final.
Score: 5/10
Kristin: Oh dear, what to say? Roko seems like such a sweet kid, and he does have the voice of an angel. But that is about it. “The Dream” is far from being dreamy. Listening to it is a snoozefest through and through and watching it even more so. Not even Elnur Huseynov’s recycled angel wings make those three minutes worth time. However, as I said before, Roko is a really talented and matured singer and I see great things in the future for him. He is the diamond in the dirt here.
Score: 3/10
William: Whether you think this is a sweet dream or a beautiful nightmare likely depends on how you handle volume. Roko gets very loud. Repeatedly and without retreat. But in my mind it just underscores the power of this song, which takes us on a journey from soft contemplation to a full-on celebration of dreams, love, and God knows what else. I’m here for Roko’s voice. I’m here for the classic — some may read that as dated — melody. And I’m here for the DRAMA. With properly wackadoodle staging this could be a surprise qualifier.
Score: 6.5/10
In the Wiwi Jury we have 29 jurors but only have room for six reviews. The remaining scores are below:
| Angus: 4.5/10
Anthony: 5/10 Antony: 6/10 Antranig: 4.5/10 Bernardo: 4/10 Calvin: 4/10 Deban: 3.5/10 Essi: 4.5/10 Florian: 2.5/10 Izhar: 4/10 Jonathan: 6/10 Josh: 5/10 |
Julian: 2/10
Lucy: 2/10 Luis: 3/10 Lukas: 5/10 Mikhail: 2/10 Oliver: 2/10 Pablo: 4/10 Robyn: 4.5/10 Ron: 4.5/10 Sebastian: 9/10 Tobias: 3.5/10 |
We have removed the highest and lowest scores prior to calculating the average. This is to remove outliers and potential bias. We have removed a low of 2 and a high of 9.
Wiwi Jury verdict: 4.26/10
What do you think of this song? Share your own score and review below!
CROATIA – Another song taking advice directly from the typical ESC manual. Big, overtly dramatic ballad with cheesy lyrics and obvious message of peace. But, unlike Norway, it doesn’t seem to be aware of that fact. It really wants to be seen as poetic and deep, which makes it even less credible. The lyrics (yes, both English and Croatian) are a compilation of the most used ESC words. The biggest gripe I have with this is that it comes off as too clinical and cold to compensate for it’s cheesiness. The biggest asset is, of course, Roko, whose voice shines… Read more »
Despite cheesy lyrics, I think Roko is a powerful vocalist and I do have pride in HIM representing us. So, even if I don’t like the song, I do wish Roko all the best! I can really see it being a grower if they nail the staging and volume pitch at ESC (unlike in Dora).
10/10 i like it a lot ….and im sure on stage in Tel Aviv this will be a big surprise …final for sure .
I feel bad for Rocko..such a beautiful voice and such an terrible and dated song! come on Croatia..you can do so much better next time!
From all the songs in this year’s contest, this is the only one I can’t stand. To me it’s like a parody of how a bad Eurovision entry sounds (and looks, thanks to the angel wings). The lyrics are cringey on so many levels: pointless message, obvious rhymes, a lot of tacky sentimentalism. The saving grace could be Roko’s powerful voice, but they found a way to misuse it. He gets annoyingly screamy in the chorus and even worst is the unnecessary high note near the end of the song. When he goes that high, it gets very unpleasant to… Read more »
So Croatia is your 41st place?
By far. Montenegro grew on me a little bit. Not enough to avoid the bottom positions, but it’s a song that I can actually enjoy when I’m in the right mood. This is the only one I never managed to see something positive about.
I must give him that: the man has a very powerful voice. Maybe in a less over the top song I could enjoy it.
7/10
You are really hilariousss. Hahaha NO! The stupidest comment that I ever seen.
Amazing singer, amazing vocal! Good luck Croatia!
Can’t stand this entry. It’s just the typical Croatian entry….outstandingly annoying and irritating as hell. Croatia is such a beautiful country, I would love to see them try harder. Also, Jacques Houdek is the Croatian Louis Walsh. A self-proclaimed song writer who is a dated as history itself.
Croatia, I want to support you but I just can’t. Every year you send the most cringeworthy song to ESC. Just please….try! I know you can do it. C’mon Zagreb 2021!!! But for now, this does nothing for me. A generous 1/10.
Roko has the vocals, but Eurovision is not about screaming the chorus over and over again as he does. “The Dream” becomes annoying after the first minute when he starts to yell at the microphone. Singing isn’t screaming. The song is dated, cheap and uninspired and the lyrics cheesy. He better sings in Croatian because a 10-year-old child could write something more interesting in English. It isn’t better in Croatian, because it is full of words I’ve already heard before a thousand times in other Balkans entries like “luva je”, “molitva”, … but at least I don’t understand the rest.… Read more »
Sorry this is my 41. I think I would like Dream A LOT more if it was all in Croatian but the lyrics are just I don’t want to be mean but terrible. 1.5/10
He’s like the Alekseev of this year because polls are rigged by people who overrate their country’s song.
I’d give this a 0.5/10 and that is for the voice. He is amazing, but he is wasted on this autrociously dated and cheesy song. The voice is too much and that makes him a cold bi**h when he performs the song. The package is the worst of the year at this state and it would take a miracle to make this nightmare in a dream, which the song is supposed to be, judging by the title.
he is an amazing singer, watched his Voice stuff . * The writings on the wall* is shockingly good as were the rest of the songs he performed, very versatile. I like this song and the revamp is good. If zelyiko was singing this it would be in top ten.
I am being filtered quite regularly now, but this post above made it through with a starred word. Not good.
Haha! My very short comment didn’t even make it past the filter. It wasn’t very insightful anyhow. You miss nothing.
I’ve got mine deleted from North Macedonia post. Have no idea why thought,
My comment about Albania’s entry is still missing. But probably yours wasn’t deleted, Dawid. The thing is that sometimes those comments appear to us as published when we submit them, only when we refresh the page we see it was filtered. It’s so weird, that there was a time I was able to edit my comment and it hasn’t been published anyway.
I love this song. I could use this to prank my friends.
It does start out decent but then it turns into a vocal show off which is on loop and a bit irritating even. The guy can sing but I don’t think this will do well . 4/10. The running order doesn’t help it , Malta will pop way more than this reducing 0.5 points and I don’t see any support coming for this outside of diaspora , so another point and half reduced. 20% chance to go through , I’d think
There’s not much more I can add here that hasn’t already been said. Best of luck to Roko for the future.
this tbh. this song needed an operatic singer, roko’s voice is too pop. houdek should’ve kept it for himself
Make an exception to Roko and let him keep his highest score. After all he was leading the polls a few weeks ago.
Yeah, because that was the first and only time when we saw rigged Wiwi poll.
Do you have a Top 41 on YouTube with over 55k views ?
That channel had the same name as your username on here , so I was just wondering
There is more than one Tibor? My mind is blown.
0.5/10
I can’t stand this mess.
He has a voice of angel (quite literally) but the song belongs to the musical hell. It’s just boring and unpleasant, like someone hitting my head with a brick over and over again. The song clearly tries to convey a message, but all I feel right afterwards is a headache. So from me it’s 1.5/10 + <3 for Roko's (wasted) talent.
These extremely low scores are no surprise. Not because Roko and his song are that bad but because bashing the Croatian entry seems to be very “in” this year.
I have impression that every year fandom has some kind of overpraised fanwanks and, on the other hand, ”sacrificial lamb” who is everyone bashing, this year it’s Roko.
If you think Croatia is being bashed, wait til they review Montenegro…
Noooo!
I appologize in advance, but I have quite an unfavorable review set for Montenegro. 🙁
Owh dear 🙁
But don’t worry. I won’t leave over it.
I do have it ranked lower than Croatia…
Yes, clearly you and I could better chat about anything else but music! 😉
His voice is almost out of this world. I was wowed the first time I listen to it, I was wowed during his Madrid performance. The song – I don’t hate it, thanks to Roko, but I don’t love it. I don’t think it will qualify.
i’d love to read sebastian’s review since he gave this a 9… to me issa 1/10 for the effort, it’s just so bad in every way
WOW, that is a generous score from you.
I will post my review soon, but I have to say that I disliked it at lot at first, but now it’s growing on me a bit. Roko is amazing on stage and that Madrid performance served in his favor. Still a cheesy (and not self-aware) song, though. I have a question for Robyn (and Wiwi in general) and that is – Is there a possibility of changing the score to a song and *edit* it on demand, or has that ship sailed the moment 15 minutes mark passed and now only thing I can do is re-post it? Not… Read more »
Roko indeed has a very strong stage presence and could try a hand at acting as well as singing. But, he needs to stop “scooping” the ends of his notes, vocally, because it’s very irritating on the ears.
Am with you on this one, Colin.
What is surprising me is how bad the national final performance of the song was compared to what Roko demonstrated in Madrid. I mean, it still needs to get rid of those English lyrics (and those wings, my God) but yeah, this is not the dead-on-arrival entry that I thought it was originally.
He needs to get rid of that white jacket too 😛
Send the Croatian version! 4/10
Dear Roko: Get rid of “y’all know who” after Eurovision asap and do your own thing, cause you have the voice and the beauty, but not in this collaboration…
u need to stop lusting for this kid omg
LOL! He is 19, I am 22 – but yeah, you are right, sweetie Eliot gets jealous! 😀
Voldemort was involved in this production?
Yes, of course 😀 He also gave my beloved Kate Miller-Heidke the dementor on stage…
The second part of the song is less cringy because I don’t understand Croatian. Good voice but horrible song unfortunately. ..and I won’t even start about that outfit ; -)
You only have to hear the first verses to know where this is going to. It is glucose syrup injected right into the veins and 40 kg of cheese on a single slice of bread. Why “My Friend” qualified remains as one of history’s biggest misteries, and “The Dream” is Houdek at his worst. The lyrics are just painful to listen to from the very beginning. What saves it from being at the very bottom of my list is that there are worse songs in my opinion, and that Roko is a talented singer who deserves a much better song.… Read more »
Yeah, it is bad, but there are worse entries this year. Croatian/ acoustic version was much better.
The nice person inside me wants to say a score that low is harsh, but sadly I feel it’s justified for this entry